Trevor’s interview shows ignorance is not bliss

I’m often inspired to write from conversations I have with friends. And memories of my childhood. Often it is hard for me to get the words from my head to screen or paper but they find their way out.

Recently, I discussed a certain episode of a certain show with a friend, a.k.a the Tomi Lahren episode of the Daily Show.

As you can imagine, it got heated, but in the sense that we were both on the same page about Lahren and just trying to wrap out minds around the idea that someone could be as ignorant as her. The conversation made me think about the importance of the episode more clearly.

For those who don’t know, Tomi Lahren is a political commentator and host of TheBlaze. She is known for being very critical of the Black Lives Matter movement and anything connected to it (including Jesse Williams, Colin Kaepernick and Beyonce).

Her reaction to Jesse WilliamsHer reaction to Colin Kaepernick

She’s also tweeted lovely things like:

Tomi and Trevor represent the opposite sides of the millennial generation, at least politically. Trevor is more liberal and progressive in his views, with Tomi is more conservative. So, the fact that Trevor was going to have her on his show sparked interest in a lot of people.

Then I saw this, on top of a long Facebook thread conversation:

I think Trevor’s intentions of having Lahren on the show was to try to understand her point of view. In the mist of trying to make sense of her logic, he asked her how she thought people should protest, since she was so against Kaepernick taking a knee and BLM supporters protesting the streets. She never really answered the question, but she instead repeatedly talk about how disrespecting the flag was unacceptable.

The only thing she said was that people just need to shut up when it comes to talking about their oppression. The crazy thing to me is that this is such a common thing when talking to people that think the same way as her. When she’s alone in her studio with just a camera, she’s passionate and critical and has all kinds of crap to say. But, while I hope she was uncomfortable, because she did look uncomfortable at times during the interview, when confronted by real life people, she freezes up. People like her will go around and around and you basically end up looking like this:

The important thing, the main thing I got from this interview, was that we need to stop normalizing bigotry. She kept saying that the American flag is a symbol of hope for some people, and that makes sense, FOR HER. The flag doesn’t mean the same to everyone, that’s what she doesn’t understand. To put it simply, not everyone has the same experiences in life.

When I think or hear or see anything about Lahren, I immediately think of ignorance. When watching her interview with Trevor, I saw a privileged white girl telling a black man essentially, she doesn’t care about his black life. She doesn’t care, she just likes to complain. She reminds me so much of Trump, who she supported, because of the way she says things as if they are fact without anything to back up her claims.

Sure, in the long run, she will be most irrelevant when it comes to American society. There’s been a spark and I see it amongst my peers. It’s scary and exciting, but it’s important to be on the right side of history.

2 thoughts on “Trevor’s interview shows ignorance is not bliss”

I absolutely adore Trevor and I tried so, so hard to watch this episode. I respect Trevor a lot for having her on, someone who is polar opposite of him, but I couldn’t stomach it. Her ignorance was physically making me ill. Her ideals are laced with, as you said so perfectly, her normalizing bigotry.

I hear people talk constantly about how they don’t understand why minorities “just seem SO angry!” People are crying out for the arrest of flag burners but defend cops who murder black teens. People are offended by Kaepernick’s peaceful protest yet elected a rapist, racist and misogynist as the president of our country.

I simply don’t understand how people can be so ignorant. The fact is that yes, all lives matter, but right now they so obviously are NOT being treated as such, and it is a severe problem in dire need of fixing. We keep screaming Black Live Matters because so many people aren’t acting like they matter. It is so blatantly obvious, but I suppose when you’re white, rich, heathy and have a thick bubble around you, that’s all quite easy to ignore.

Thank you so much for reading! It’s a constant struggle dealing with ignorant people like Lahren, but the more we’re informed, the more we talk about it, the more we can work towards combatting the hate.